Thursday, 18 September, 2014, 5.00 p.m.-7.30 p.m.
Hungarian Academy of Sciences/Magyar Tudományos Akadémia
Grand Hall, Main Building, Budapest
V. Széchenyi tér 9
(Beside Chain-Bridge, Pest side of Danube)
Followed by gathering at Jack Doyle’s Irish Bar, V. Pilvax köz 1-3
At the corner of Pilvax köz/Városháza street
Organised by:
- Széchenyi Academy of Letters and Arts
- Budapest Centre for Irish Studies (BCIS)
- Department of English Studies, Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest
Supported by: The Embassy of Ireland, Hungary
Programme
Introductions:
- H.E. Kevin Dowling, Irish Ambassador to Hungary
- Dr. Győző Ferencz, Executive President of the Széchenyi Academy of Letters and Arts; Associate Professor at the Department of English Studies, Eötvös Loránd University (ELTE), Budapest
- Dr. Michael McAteer, Director of the Budapest Centre for Irish Studies; Associate Professor at the Department of English, Pázmány Péter Catholic University (PPKE), Budapest
The Seamus Heaney Memorial Lecture:
One Year On: Remembering Seamus Heaney, A Great Poet and Man
Medbh McGuckian,
Poet and Lecturer in Creative Writing
The Seamus Heaney Centre for Poetry,
Queen’s University, Belfast
Musical Recitals:
1. Zoltán Jeney’s Soliloquium No. 1,
2. Barnabas Dukay’s . . . from sunlight, water, and stones . . . ,
3. Ádám Kondor’s Bizarre Objects No. 10 – Castello Imitazione (World Premiere)
Performed by Anna Rákóczy (flute) and László Borbély (piano)
Zoltán Jeney’s Threnodies from the Funeral Rites:
1. Lamento
2. The Virgin’s Lament
3. Dark Shadow, Listen, Can You Hear Me?
4. My Adored Fallen to the Foot of the Crucifix
5. All is to Vanish
Performed by Zsuzsanna Lukin (mezzo-soprano), and Péter Nagy (piano)
Sláinte/Egészségére:
A pint of Guinness afterwards at Jack Doyle’s Irish Bar, 8.00 p.m.
Medbh McGuckian is one of the most distinctive voices in English-language poetry of the past 40 years. Born in Belfast in 1950, Medbh studied at Queen’s University, Belfast, during Seamus Heaney’s time there. Her first major poetry collection, The Flower Master (1982), received widespread critical acclaim and between 1985-88 she was the first female writer to hold the post of Writer-in-Residence at the School of English, Queen’s University, Belfast. She has published fifteen poetry collections in total, her most recent, The High Caul Cap, appearing in 2013. Her volume, Selected Poems: 1978-1994, (a Poetry Book Society recommendation) was published in 1997. Medbh McGuckian has also edited a volume of new poets from Northern Ireland, translated (with Eiléan Ní Chuilleanáin), a selection of Irish-language poems by Nuala Ní Dhomhnaill, and published a book of critical reflections on Seamus Heaney’s work. Her work has received many prestigious awards: the British National Poetry Competition; the Cheltenham Award; the Alice Hunt-Bartlett Prize; the Rooney Prize and the American-Ireland Fund Literary Award. She has held the position of Writer-in-Residence at the University of Ulster, the University of California, Berkeley, Trinity College Dublin.
